Abstract

Red rot of sugarcane caused by Colletotrichum falcatum is the major devastating disease of sugarcane. This disease causes losses in both sugarcane yield and sugar recovery. Most commonly affected areas of India are Bihar, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh but now it spreads to coastal areas of Tamil Nadu and Gujarat. The primary aim of this study was to isolate Bacillus strains from different climatic condition and check the antifungal activity against three different strains of Colletotrichum falcatum isolated from affected sugarcane grown in South Gujarat. A total of 45 Bacillus strains were isolated from different samples. Seven out of these isolates showed significant inhibition against all the three strains of the pathogen Colletotrichum falcatum (i.e. CFNAV, CFTIM and CFKAM). One from these seven isolates, the Bacillus spp. strain AV5 showed the maximum inhibition (percentage) of the three fungus strains (i.e. 60, 58 and 55 respectively) suggesting its potential use as bio-control agent for the red rot of sugarcane.



Comments


Must Read